Water Wars (NPR Michiana Chronicles WVPE 88.1 FM)

My family went to war this week with a
neighboring house. We planned and prepared and plotted the attack.We are civilized people and we warned them,
we did the chivalrous things and then we told them how it was.Although children should be shielded from all
aspects of war, we used our innocent daughters to deliver the initial
blow.They carried the formal written
challenge in a Turkish letter scroll carrier made of metal carved with filigree
and finesse.They chose matching dresses
for their courier uniform.They crossed
the street and knocked politely.(They
did have to knock louder the second time, but they did not relent.) Our girls
greeted the neighbor and stood outside after curtly stating “We will wait for
your reply”.The challenge was accepted.The time of battle was set for 1:00pm July 4th,
2017.

You may realize I do not get out much.I’m not too fun, I like things tidy and I’m
the kind of mama who tries to avoid a mess.I am a decent parent so I say “No” and “Clean that up” and “Eat your
dinner, use your napkin why isn’t your napkin in your
lapstoptalkingwithyourmouthful!”I try
to tip the balance in my favor occasionally.For example;I buy too many ice
cream cones.We go out in pajamas.I bring home crafts and we fuss in the kitchen
together.I also have a secret: I like a
good water balloon fight.

I’ve purchased crummy cheap squirt guns that
get ruined with sand at the beach, and we have struggled to fill water balloons
at least once a summer. Then something happened:Some company called Zuru made instant fills
& seal water balloon kits (and charge the equivalent of college tuition for
them).I watched them in the stores all
last year.Too much money for something
that would essentially last five minutes and then need to be cleaned up.
Everything changed when we made our bi-annual Costco trip and they had 350
water balloons for $20.The wheels began
to turn and we declared war.Or I sent a
text message anyway:

US:R u
around this weekend?There may be a
family challenge pending.

THEM: Bring it. Down 1 kid so it’s even numbers

US: The House of Rochon may be challenged by the
House of Novak to a water fight within the next24 hours.

I also included a Bitmoji of myself as Wonder
Woman that said “BRACE YOURSELF”.(If you
do not yet “BITMOJI”, you might want to start!)

I sent text messages to some of our other
neighbors alerting them to the battle between the House of Novak and the House
of Rochon.I invited them to join in or
to watch.Many of our neighbors make the
effort to connect regularly in large and small ways and it feels good to really
know my neighbors.

My husband started looking over the directions
for the water balloons, another daughter brought a laundry basket upstairs to
hold our squishy, bulbous weapons.My
suggestion of running to Michaels for war paint was rejected.The breakfast dishes weren’t going to wash
themselves so I turned on Spotify and found the playlist “Epic War Songs for
Glorious Motivation” and cranked up the volume.Dishes aren’t exactly inspiring, but the music was.

Before long it was time to begin assembling
munitions which included three mangy squirt guns in addition to our 350 Zuru
water balloons in magic quick fill clusters.My husband had the proper wrist finesse to detach the filled balloons,
so he did that while I used our kid’s wagon to move laundry baskets of ammo
across the street to our neighbors’ neighbor’s yard.We set six year old Libby as the guard of the
goods.She sat in the wagon armed with a
water balloon and a crummy squirt gun.She was impossibly cute and ferocious.

I made flower crowns for the Queen of both
Households.We got a selfie in them,
which is great because they were decimated within five minutes.I’d decreed the winner of this battle would be
determined by which side was wettest and which crown was stolen first.The crowns were just gone almost immediately and
the House of Novak fell to their foe wetly with plopping sound effects.There may have been a home court advantage in
the form of a hose, but all is fair in love and war.The House of Rochon offered us losers some
pretty great brownies with whipped cream.Brownies soften the sting of defeat. House of Rochon, prepare for a
rematch…we can bring the brownies this time!

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About Me

My adventures as a sales and customer service trainer, consultant, life coach and motivational speaker have taught me many things about people, work life, possible joy and how far we have yet to come. I hope to encourage people to live their love out loud in every area of their lives.